ARTICLE CONTINUATION

Tyre nichols:

Continued from cover o cials at the nonpro t e Black Girl’s Guide To Healing Emotional Wounds wrote in a statement. ey pleaded, “please, my friends, don’t share it or watch it. Let’s keep the family in our prayers and work to identify solutions to this nonsense.”

On Friday, January 27, over an hour of footage was extracted from the o cers’ body cameras and an overhead surveillance video that the men in blue were apparently unaware existed.

Each o cer was arrested and terminated. ey have been charged with second-degree murder, kidnapping, and other crimes in connection with Nichols’ death.

Sheriff Floyd Bonner Jr. said in a statement that two additional Shelby County sheri ’s deputies were placed on administrative leave pending the outcome of an investigation.

A body camera worn by an ocer revealed that Tyre was initially confronted on January 7 at 8:24 p.m. During what appeared to be a standard tra c stop, several ocers approached with their weapons drawn.

Immediate hostility ensued, with one o cer threatening Tyre, “You’re going to get your [expletive] blown o .”

Nichols is heard saying, “I’m just trying to go home. I’m not doing anything.”

He is then sprayed with pepper spray and repeatedly attacked. One of the o cers can be heard struggling to catch his breath while cursing Nichols due to the severity of the beating.

Nichols begins yelling for his

Student funding:

Continued from cover in the Assembly and the Senate, led by the great work that former Assemblymember Weber and now current member Weber is doing in terms of equity,”

“We’re committing an additional $300 million in this year’s budget,” Newsom described the program. Newsom was referring to the efforts Secretary of State Dr. Shirley Weber made with Assembly Bill (AB) 2635 and her daughter, Assemblymember Dr. Akilah Weber (D-San Diego), with AB 2774. The bills were written to fix the LCFF by creating a supplemental grant for California’s lowest-performing subgroup of students not currently receiving funding, which are African American students.

Black students have consistently been the lowest performing students in the state. Currently, 70% are not meeting the English Language Arts standards and 84% are not meeting math standards.

About 80,000 African American students -- or just over 25% -- are not receiving additional supple -

COVID-19:

Continued from cover bring the emergency to an immediate end. House Republicans are also gearing up to launch investigations on the federal government’s response to COVID-19.

Then-President Donald Trump’s Health and Human Services mother in a manner eerily similar to that of George Floyd, a Black man killed by police in 2020 in Minneapolis.

Secretary Alex Azar first declared a public health emergency on Jan. 31, 2020, and Trump later declared the COVID-19 pandemic a national emergency that March.

One of the o cers, displaying no compassion, pulls out a baton and yells, “I’m going to baton the [bleep] out of you!” e release of the video sparked protests across the country, including in the District of Columbia, New York, Los Angeles, and Memphis, where the crime took place.

As the young man struggles to regain his balance, the officer strikes Nichols multiple times with the baton, while other o cers can be seen punching him in the face and head.

O cers eventually drag Nichols and toss him against a patrol car. More than 21 minutes pass before emergency medical personnel arrive, during which time the o cers celebrate their victory by st-bumping and laughing about their crime.

In addition to civil rights organizations, federal lawmakers ooded journalists’ email inboxes with mental funding or accountability through the LCFF.

It’s only by targeting additional funds to the lowest performing subgroup that most school districts will be willing to adopt specific and concrete solutions to bridge the achievement gap for Black students.

Although Shirley Weber had shelved the bill in 2018, Gov. Jerry Brown agreed to fund AB 2635 with $300 million in one-time money. The funding went to “low performing students” not the “lowest-performing student subgroup”.

It is estimated that Black students received about 8% of that amount.

Last year, AB 2774 passed through the Senate and Assembly without opposition, but Akilah Weber opted to pull the bill before it was sent to Newsom due to potential constitutional issues and lack of an appropriation to fund it. However, she secured Newsom’s commitment to include it in the 2023 budget – targeted funding that would address the needs of Black students.

However, the LCFF Equity

The emergencies have been repeatedly extended by Biden since he took office in January 2021, and are set to expire in the coming months. The White House said Biden plans to extend them both briefly to end on May 11.

“An abrupt end to the emergency declarations would create wide-ranging chaos and uncertainty throughout the health care system — for states, for hospitals and doctors’ offices, and, most importantly, for tens of millions of Americans,” the Office of Management and Budget wrote statements condemning the o cers. As is their custom, lawmakers promised legislation to reform American policing. Similar promises were made a er the murders of Floyd in Minneapolis, Breonna Taylor in Kentucky, Tamir Rice in Ohio, and Eric Garner in New York, among numerous others.

Multiplier Program Newsom is proposing falls short of the expectations of the educators and education advocates that supported AB 2774. They formed the Black in School Coalition and they are asking Newsom to develop a program more like AB 2774.

Coalition member Debra Watkins, Founder and Executive Director of the California Alliance of African American Educators, told California Black Media (CBM) the program was, “Almost the opposite of what we were asking for… it’s misguided.”

Dr. Margaret Fortune, the president and CEO of Fortune School of Education, a charter school network based in Sacramento told CBM, “You have a proposal that is put out there as the solution for Black kids, but the funding is not going to get to the Black kids.”

The Equity Multiplier Program is a $300 million ongoing add-on to the LCFF to accelerate gains in closing opportunity and outcome gaps.

The funds will be allocated to LEAs (Local Educational Agency) which are a school district, county office of education, or charter school with schools serving high concentrations of students eligible for free in a Statement of Administration Policy.

More than 1.1 million people in the U.S. have died from COVID19 since 2020, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including about 3,700 last week.

Congress has already blunted the reach of the public health emergency that had the most direct impact on Americans, as political calls to end the declaration intensified. Lawmakers have refused for months to fulfill the Biden administration’s request for billions more

“ is does not represent policing or the men and women who wear a badge and dutifully protect their communities. I hesitate to even call these men police o cers, because what I saw on that video is not policing. ey deserve the strongest punishment allowed by Tennessee law.”

Boatwright added that in his state, “we have had historic police reform in our state over the last 5 years to ensure these types of actions don’t occur in Maryland. We will continue to be a partner with our communities as we work to protect those we serve.”

Patrick Gaspard, the president and CEO of the Center for American Progress, called driving while Black “one of the most dangerous acts in America.” meals (90% or more free meal eligibility for elementary and middle schools and 85% or more free meal eligibility for high schools).

“As we all just witnessed in the searing video of the brutal slaughter of Tyre Nichols at the hands of police who are paid by us to protect all of us. e evidence here is startling and indisputable. ese o cers need to be tried, convicted, and imprisoned to satisfy justice and to send a message to police in all of our cities that this culture of violence in their ranks will no longer be sanctioned,” Gaspard stated.

President Joe Biden said he spoke with Nichols’ family and expressed his outrage.

“Like so many, I was outraged and deeply pained to see the horri c video of the beating that resulted in Tyre Nichols’ death,” the president stated.

In contrast, the Memphis officers were immediately red and arrested, and the police unions did not o er them any support.

“What I witnessed in that video was horri c. It was a barbaric assault on another human being and is sickening,” Maryland State Fraternal Order of Police President Clyde Boatwright said.

Brooks Allen, Education Policy Advisor to the Governor and Executive Director of the California State Board of Education, revealed to CBM that budget trailer bill language is being written to strengthen the ties between the three elements of California’s accountability system: the LCAP, the California School Dashboard, and the Statewide System of Support.

According to Allen, the trailer bill will require LEAs, where student group performance is low on a Dashboard indicator at the school level, to include specific goals, actions, and funding to address these demonstrated student group and school-level needs in the LCAP and LEA budget.

Assemblymember Weber told CBM, “I am a huge supporter of this proposal in its entirety…. It’s about making sure that the money that we’re getting is being used properly. That it’s going to the students that are supposed to be getting it and making sure that whatever indicators that we have found to indicate poor academic performance are being improved.” dollars to extend free COVID vaccines and testing. And the $1.7 trillion spending package passed last year and signed into law by Biden put an end to a rule that barred states from kicking people off Medicaid, a move that is expected to see millions of people lose their coverage after April 1. Some things will change for Americans once the emergency expires. e costs of COVID-19 vaccines are expected to skyrocket. People with private insurance could have some out-of-pocket costs for vaccines. Free at-home COVID

“It is yet another painful reminder of the profound fear and trauma, the pain, and the exhaustion that Black and Brown Americans experience every single day.”

Editors Note: At press time, the Memphis Police Department suspended a sixth officer, Preston Hemphill, on Monday, January 30th, 2023, according to Reuters

Watkins is not convinced. “LCFF is almost 10 years old, and accountability was baked into it. That accountability legislated through LCFF has failed Black children. The money that was supposed to be directed to Black children, hasn’t gone to them.” tests will also come to an end. Legislators did extend for another two years telehealth flexibilities that were introduced as COVID19 hit, leading health care systems around the country to regularly deliver care by smartphone or computer.

The Governor’s program is trying to address the needs of Black students given constitutional constraints. But his office has not let the press know what the constraints are.

The advocates for improving Black student performance are urging Newsom not to shy away from the possibility of being sued.

The discussions about the LCFF Equity Multiplier have been conducted without the benefit of the budget trailer bill language. Details are expected to be available in early February.

Negotiations on how best to fund Black students are expected to be ongoing with the Governor’s office, the Black in School Coalition and the Legislature until May 15 when Newsom releases his May budget revision. And further negotiations will likely continue until the June 15 deadline for the Legislature to pass the budget bill.

Officials said the administration would use the next three months to transition the response to conventional methods, warning that an immediate end to the emergency authorities “would sow confusion and chaos into this critical winddown.”

Cecil H. Steppe, former Director of the San Diego County Department of Social Services, has accomplished great things, so much so that a street on the 900-1000 block of 47th Street has been named in his honor.

Mr. Steppe turned 90 years old on Tuesday, January 31, 2023. To honor him on his birthday, family, friends, colleagues, and community members gathered in celebration at Gompers Preparatory Academy, where he has served as the Chairman of the Board of Directors for the last 18 years.

In addition to the birthday celebration, a portion of 47th Street, from Hilltop Dr. to C Street, was honorarily named Cecil H. Steppe Street.

Mr. Steppe raised five children, all while working three jobs, attending San Diego City College before transferring to California Western College where he earned his B.S. degree in Sociology. He started as a Probation Intern in 1964, eventually achieving notable milestones on his way up the

His accomplishments are many: twelve years, beginning in 1980, as San Diego County’s Chief Probation Officer; seven years as Director of the County of San Diego’s Social Services department (1992 - 1999); five years as President/CEO of the San Diego Urban League (2001 - 2007); San Diego Rotary “Man of the Year” (2004); Board Chairperson for Gompers Preparatory Academy (GPA) Charter School (2005), and time devoted to the Board of Directors for both Sharp Health Care’s and Goodwill of San Diego’s.

Mr. Steppe’s service to the larger San Diego community is not over. As aforementioned, he currently serves on the board at Gompers Preparatory. He also currently serves as the Chairman of the Board of Directors at Mental Health of America San Diego, and as the Chairman of the Board of Directors at Vista Hill Foundation.

Now, there is a sacred space on 47th Street specially dedicated to one of Southeast’s own.